The collection of artistic works by Józef Czapski at the National Museum in Krakow currently amounts to 27 oil paintings, 3 etchings, and 15 drawings (loose, not collated in folios). In the years 2019–2022, the NMK received as gifts or otherwise acquired 4 oil paintings, an ink drawing, and Czapski’s table from the collection of Renata and Marek Szypulski and the Polish Humanitarian Fund in France, as well as etchings from the collection of Barbara and Richard Aeschlimann.
Cyprian Kamil Norwid was – along with Simone Weil, Stanisław Brzozowski, and Marcel Proust – the most important spiritual guide for Czapski. Research in the Józef and Maria Czapski archives, which are also part of the NMK collections, have allowed us to recreate the remarkable stories of these acquisitions (one of the paintings, for instance, belonged to Zbigniew and Katarzyna Herbert) and to fill in gaps in knowledge of the artist’s technique (such as the method used to create the etchings, a subject which was introduced to the artist by Norwid). (Agnieszka Kosińska, curator)
